The case of alex morton

Accountant Alex Morton was caught by his boss Jane Clarkson rifling through a colleague’s suit pocket in the office cloakroom. Before managing to explain just what his hand was doing in Iman’s pocket – beyond a stuttered mention of ‘difficult time’ and ‘cigarettes’ - Alex was suspended pending a full investigation. Mind you, Ms Clarkson’s steely gaze and curt interrogation would have left a lot of people quivering. This wasn’t actually a real life scenario – it was actors from Roleplay UK demonstrating pertinent points about workplace grievance and disciplinary procedures at our Half Day Employment Law Briefing. It was a fascinating way to learn about the changes to legislation being introduced on April 6 and worked brilliantly alongside presentations by employment law experts from Hegarty LLP Solicitors. Around 70 HR managers from Greater Peterborough attended the event at the National Centre for Deafblindness in Peterborough. It became a very interactive session with their expertise being called upon to direct the actors in how and how not to handle difficult situations. Feedback so far has been excellent which is always pleasing when organising an event that’s just a little bit different.As for Alex – Ms Clarkson found him guilty and fired him. Read more about the event at our news section.

ACR lobbying Government over VAT changes

We work with a number of charities in the Greater Peterborough area, placing temporary staff with them. Those temps are invaluable - providing charities with the type of short term help which ensures they can deliver the best service possible to those who depend on them.
That is now under threat.
On April 1 the Government is withdrawing a concession which has been in place for 12 years. During that time, a number of sectors including charities, various parts of the public sector including health, care and education and some financial organisations have been exempt from paying VAT on the wages of temporary staff. That’s set to change.
And the knock on effects could be enormous.
Charities relying on temporary staff may find it impossible to justify the extra cost and so cut the amount of temps they use. With less staff the work the organisations can do will be affected.
Of course, with less call for temps, those workers will find themselves out of a job, boosting the current unemployment figure which already stands at more than two million. We work closely with the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and they’re saying around 150,000 temporary jobs could be affected by the change.
With all this in mind, we’ve been talking to our Peterborough MP Stewart Jackson in an effort to persuade him to take up the fight. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem that our lobbying has done any good on this occasion and the legislation is still set to be introduced next week.
We’re working hard with various charities to ensure the necessary strategies are in place to deal with the change in the law.
But ultimately we’re going to keep talking to the right people in the hope the decision will be reversed.
If you want to further information please refer to our legal zone or contact us to get involved.

Employment law to feature centre stage

The final preparations are being made for the latest addition to our events calendar – the Employment Law Half Day Briefing.

We run a breakfast briefing each Autumn in conjunction with Hegarty LLP Solicitors. But this year the raft of new legislation covering disciplinary and grievance procedures has prompted the addition of an extra briefing.

RolePlay UK have joined us in this venture, refreshing the format for the morning. They use trained actors to illustrate the points being made. So, employment law specialists Tim Thompson and Martin Bloom from Hegarty’s will speak on the new legislation dealing with discipline, grievance and dismissal situations and the new ACAS Code of Practice. The subjects will then be demonstrated by the actors emulating potential real-life scenarios.

This is something completely new for us and I’m really looking forward to seeing it in action. It should be a very visual way of demonstrating the points being made and hopefully all the delegates – and us too – will learn some useful information.

The event is taking place next Tuesday – March 24 – at the National Centre for Deafblindness in Peterborough.

Feel free to get in touch if you’d like more information. info@annecorder.co.uk

ACR scores ISO success

We’re rather pleased with ourselves in the office today following yesterday’s ISO inspection.
Not only have we achieved our ISO accreditation for the 14th year running, the inspector said we already comply with the requirements of the newly-introduced standard which won’t be mandatory until next year.
We work hard to ensure we deliver best practice in every aspect of our business and we certainly feel we deserve to receive the accreditation. But we never get complacent. It’s an on-going process which everyone in the business is vital to.
The inspector commented particularly on our efforts to maintain a paperless office and the ‘professional manner’ in which staff maintain the quality management system.
So, we are now the proud recipients of ISO 9001:2008.

Business Awards hailed success by ACR

I was delighted to be involved, once again, with the Stamford Mercury Business Awards which culminated in a rather smart awards ceremony on Thursday.
The awards recognise the best of local businesses, business people and business achievements.
For the second year running, we sponsored the Business of the Year award with Greetham Valley Hotel, Golf and Conference Centre.
I judged the category alongside Nick Quinn from Greetham Valley and I have to say I was incredibly impressed by the amount of dedication, hard work and creativity there is within the business community – the kind of attributes which are going to be vital over the next year.
The three finalists all displayed not only impressive results but fantastic future potential.
Nick and I chose Rutland Cycling as worthy winners of the award. The team at the Rutland Water based business has obviously worked incredibly hard to build up the business and is constantly exploring new avenues.
It was wonderful to see the representatives who received the award obviously so delighted.
A big well done to them – and the very worthy runners up Indigo Resourcing and RolePlay UK.
And a big thank you as well to the Stamford Mercury and Greetham Valley for a superbly put together and enjoyable evening.

Managing your workforce

With seemingly every news bulletin delivering a fresh blow to our fragile economy it’s easy to think the only businesses which will find a way through the recession will be those who think on their feet and react fast.
But we’re encouraging our clients to take a more creative, long term view.
I know that goes against the grain when all the graphs are heading the wrong way but it’s less about knee jerk reactions and more about making sure everything’s in place to provide the most stable business now and in the future.
Redundancy is, unfortunately, common place but is it always necessary?
Making people redundant and recruiting again later when the market picks up is expensive – and doesn’t always paint the best picture of a company as a fair employer either.
We’re working with our clients to ensure they’re getting the best out of their employees possibly through retraining and, if necessary, refocusing resources. It’s known as smartworking.
There is help for businesses looking to ensure they’re getting the best out of their workforce and operating to their optimum. And there’s no shame in asking for it.

Feel free to get in touch with us and we’re always interested to hear ideas of how else we might be able to use our expertise to help companies. info@annecorder.co.uk